My View: Two great successes show value of anti-HIV efforts

In the history of the decadeslong search to find successful prevention interventions that people will use and that will work to prevent the transmission of HIV, there have been two great successes.

Jeffrey Kraus

In the history of the decadeslong search to find successful prevention interventions that people will use and that will work to prevent the transmission of HIV, there have been two great successes.

One is the near elimination of transmission of HIV from an HIV-positive mother to her child during pregnancy and childbirth by the use of anti-HIV medications. At one time, HIV-positive mothers transmitted HIV to their children 15-20 percent of the time. Transmission has now been reduced to well below 1 percent in the United States.

The other great success has been harm reduction/needle exchange programs. Such programs have reduced the rate of HIV infection in injectable drug users from 54 percent to 13 percent in New York state, resulting in the saving of thousands of lives and many millions of dollars in treatment costs.

The data is overwhelming, from all across the country, and from all across the world, that these programs work. Study after study documents all the ways they are successful:

1) They bring hard-to-reach individuals into health care; 2) They bring long-term addicts into drug treatment; 3) They result in major reductions of HIV, hepatitis C, and other bloodborne illnesses; 4) They protect the non-drug using sexual partners of users from infections with these illnesses.

5) They cost pennies and save millions of dollars that would otherwise be spent on treating these illnesses; 6) They take used syringes off the streets; 7) They have been shown to serve only local users, not attract people from afar; and 8) They do not increase crime rates.

As stated above, it is one of the most effective public health interventions ever implemented to combat HIV.

Locally, it should be noted that Dr. Jean Hudson, Orange County health commissioner; Darcie Miller, Orange County mental health commissioner; Dr. Michael Caldwell, Dutchess County health commissioner; Dr. Sherlita Amler, Westchester County health commissioner; the Westchester County Board of Health; Dutchess County Sheriff Adrian "Butch" Anderson; the county executives of Dutchess, Orange and Westchester counties; and, at the state level, Dr. Nirav Shah, New York health commissioner, all strongly support harm reduction/syringe exchange.

This list could go on and on with many other local, state and national leaders. They know the data, they are committed to saving lives of people in need, and they are aware that such programs are vital public health interventions with proven efficacy.

All thinking and compassionate individuals and the communities they represent would be well-served to inform themselves of the empirical evidence and data, and to listen to what the experts across the country have said.

We should recognize the expertise of public health professionals and make rational, evidence-based decisions regarding programs and public policy. Lives depend on it. We are not helpless; we have something that we can do that is proven to save the lives of our friends, our neighbors, and our family members. How in good conscience can we withhold it?